Treating Dry Skin on Face

Maybe flaky, irritated, or even a little inflamed, then chances are your skin type is dry.

When your skin feels rough and tight it’s natural to want to add more moisture, but interestingly adding to much moisture can be counterproductive and here’s why.

Dry Skin is Tricky to Treat

You’d think soaking in a bath would be good for a dry skin, but actually it can do more harm than good, disrupting your skin’s protective layer and depleting surface oils.

An interesting study carried out on dry skin, compared the water content of dry, normal and oily skin, and no significant difference was found between them, in fact the surprising outcome was, that a healthy skin contains only about 30% water.

This is why I say treating dry skin on face is tricky, because in order to give your skin exactly what it needs, you have to realise that the frequency and consistency of treatments is really important.

A dry skin that produces little sebum requires surface protection in the form of emollients, these ingredients provide a protective layer over the outer layer of your skin, allowing the barrier function to repair itself, whilst preventing dehydration.

But if the skin feels parched and dehydrated, then it is lacking in moisture and requires humectants referred to as hydrohilic agents, these attract water and bind moisture to your skins cells.

Dry Skin Treatment

Cleanse: Use oil based cleanser and gently massage in, this will help to break down stubborn make up bonds.

The best technique is to wet your skin with tepid water, because a damp skin will help to seal in valuable ingredients, next gently remove with a damp muslin cloth so you don’t cause friction.

Tone: To prepare the skin for the much needed moisture, spray the skin with a nonalcoholic toner, preferably one full of lovely humectants and gently pat your skin dry.

Moisturise: What your dry skin now requires is barrier-repairing ingredients.

A good moisturiser will help to reconstitute the skins hydro-lipid film, preserving your skins natural lipids (oils), trapping and locking oil into the tissues.

Exfoliate: Treating dry skin on face is not easy, but a well-formulated exfoliant will help to gently loosen stubborn skin cells, removing cellular build up and replacing them with newer, smoother ones.

Do this once or twice a week, to encourage gentle stimulation of the cell renewal cycle, this will help to promote the healthy function of your skins cells, improving hydration and the natural production of inter-cellular lipids.

Be sure to only use gentle exfoliants, nothing that uses irregular abrasive grains that may cause inflammation and damage your skin.

Serums: These offer your skin an additional layer of moisturisation and protection, I like to refer to them as layering, which is perfect for treating dry skin on face.

The other great thing about serums is that they are so concentrated, that the ingredients go straight to the source.

Masks: A hydrating algae or gel based mask, loaded with lovely water loving humectants, is perfect for soothing a dry, irritated skin type.

Oils: For smooth supple skin, a good night oil will become your new best friend, plantascription for dry skin lists the best oils for this skin type.

The Naked Truth

So the key is to bring your barrier function back into balance, this you can do by implementing some of the following:

Avoid rough scrubs with irregular beads, as these will cause tiny micro tears in your skin

12 Comments

Hi Samantha, Having been an active person, i find myself recently recovering from a ruptured achillis tendon and calf tear. I have been out of a cast for three weeks now yet my skin is awful. please could you recommend a cream I can buy that would help the flaking and dryness? Thank you Tracey

I don’t know where you are based, but in saying that it is less about the brand and more about the ingredients. Look for occlusive ingredients and humectants especially urea, https://thenakedchemist.com/what-is-urea-and-its-benefits-in-skincare/ …which is really going to trap moisture in your skins upper layers which is what you want for your skin, it’s the go to ingredient for cracked heels and feet, so it will no doubt give you the results you are looking for….I hope this helps…

Would you recommend the above for sebhorreic dermatitis? Includes rough dry skin build up, but extremely sensitive area, inflamed (or inflamed extremely easily within hour of wrong soap or topical applied – reaction of redness and/or possibly swollen cells(?)), large pores, often red, and has slight burning sensation even when has normal appearance. Rose balm, for example, may calm the area on my face down for a few days, but can backfire and become red in that area or nearby on cheeks, or can cause bumps – assumedly over-blocking nearby pores?

Shawna your acid mantle and barrier protection have both been undermined and you may also have rosacea as well as sebhorreic dermatitis …I would recommend copper peptide to strengthen the skin and a nourishing serum with lots of skin identical ingredients to replenish your skin…I can’t state this enough but in the interim period less is best including treatments..it’s all to easy to want to keep applying products in a bid to diffuse your skin but your only going to irritate it, just try to protect your skin from the sun please in the meantime here is a selection of articles for you…https://thenakedchemist.com/articles-sensitive-skin/

You need a moisturiser for a really dry skin, my products will be available soon so please check back. Secondly please make sure you are taking a essential fatty acid rich in omega 3,6 and 9, this will help to reduce dryness from within.

I apologise I am not that familiar with dry scalp as this is not my area of expertise. In saying that a lack of fatty acids would be a cause, and poor sebum (oil) flow, I do know that the scalp has to stimulated to get all the nutrients to the surface, so a stimulating shampoo with menthol in may help. Samantha